July 26-27, 2014 Pastor Timothy J. Spaude Text: Romans 7:15-25a “THERE’S A WAR GOING ON (IN THERE)!”

PENTECOST 7

July 26-27, 2014

Pastor Timothy J. Spaude

Text: Romans 7:15-25a

“THERE’S A WAR GOING ON  (IN THERE)!”

1.      Fighting its battles gives glory to God.

2.     The war’s victory is the glory of God!

Romans 7:15-25a (NIV 1984) “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16 And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. 17 As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. 18 I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do--this I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. 21 So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God's law; 23 but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God--through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

          The wife and children have gone to bed. The Christian man sits alone at his computer. The temptation comes to surf the net, look at a little porn. He knows it’s wrong. What will he do? The Christian alcoholic sits alone, the desire to open the bottle so strong. What will she do? The Christian student looks at the test and panics. “I don’t know this stuff! But if I sit up a little bit I should be able to see her paper.” Will he cheat? The social group is together again. Once again the character assassination begins. She knows she should speak up and defend. After last time she promised herself she would speak up. Will she? Brothers and sisters, these real life examples and many more typify the struggles with sin that go on many times each and every day in the lives of Christians. There’s a war going on in there! It’s a war between the desires of our own sinful nature and the desire of our true self, the Christian, follower of Christ that we really are. Oh, thank you, Holy Spirit, for having someone like the Apostle Paul own up to it so the rest of us can talk about it in the joy of the Gospel. We do that today as we acknowledge before God and each other, there’s a war going on in there!

          The first thing we need to remember is that fighting its battles gives glory to God. A war is made up of many battles. You can win many battles and still lose the war. Likewise you can lose battles and still win the war. When it comes to the sin war inside of us we get to rejoice that there are battles to fight. Really? Why? Having those battles, those conflicting desires between what sin wants and what Christ wants is a sign that your faith is alive and active. If there is no struggle against sin and temptation faith is dead or so weak it can’t even speak. And you know what? The closer you grow to Jesus the more sin struggles you’ll feel. It’s like going into your basement with the lights off and all looks well. Then you turn on the lights and you see there is a stain on the carpet, cobwebs in the corners. When we are far away from Jesus we might think we look OK but when you draw near Jesus in His word and your life is held up to the standard of holiness that covers deeds, words, thoughts, motives, Oh my, you see your sinfulness and once you are aware, like the Apostle Paul, the Christian response is to fight, fight the sin battles. It gives glory to God to call sin sin and want it out of our lives.

          Some of those battles you will win. “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16 And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. 17 As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.” Paul points to sin living in him getting him to do some things he hates. Paul is also reminding us that the real us, the Christian, loves God’s law and calls it good. In other places Scripture says resist the Devil and he will flee from you. No temptation comes except what is common to man and God will always give you a way out. In Ephesians 6 Paul reminded us of our spiritual armor and the sword of the Spirit, which is God’s Word to defeat temptation. Jesus showed us how it is done perfectly when He used God’s Word to defeat the Devil’s temptations for us. And the better you know God’s word when those temptations come to peek or to cheat or to keep quiet when you should speak up the Spirit will be with you reminding you of the Word and you will win some of those sin battles. That gives glory to God! And if you are a believer who has to fight some of those sins that have addictive qualities like alcohol or drug abuse or pornography, keep fighting, and know that there are believers who have won those battles.

          But what about the battles we lose? Paul owned up to if well for himself. “I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do--this I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.” You know how it goes. You beat one temptation and another pops up. Satan does not give up on us easily. He keeps at you. The sinful nature is real. There is no sinful nature bypass surgery we can have. There is no heart transplant that takes out all our sinful nature desires and replaces them with only good. Paul acknowledges that for us too. “So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God's law; 23 but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. 24 What a wretched man I am!”

          No, what a wretched man I am. What wretched folks you are. Be honest. God already knows. He knows the lust thoughts we entertain like guests instead of kicking out as the enemies they are. He knows our cheating hearts, our greed and discontent, our shading of the truths, half truths and outright lies we tell to protect ourselves, make ourselves look good or someone else bad. He knows how we weakly sit by while someone else’s reputation is trashed but quickly and proudly defend our own name. He knows the foul mouth we try to hide behind closed doors or at least when the pastor’s not around. He knows that we like Paul know that His law is good and we don’t keep it anyway. What wretched men, women and children we are. We are helpless to win this war. With the Apostle Paul we cry out, “Who will rescue me from this body of death?”

          And before we even asked, God answered. We aren’t  just wretched men, women and children. We are wretched men, women and children who know Christ! “Thanks be to God--through Jesus Christ our Lord!” Oh, yes, there’s a war going on in there. Some of its battles we win and some of them we lose but the victory in the war belongs to God. Granting us that victory is the glory of God. Did you notice that in the Old Testament reading where Moses wanted to see the glory of the Lord? What did God say? "I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” God’s glory is to have mercy and compassion on sinners. What did Jesus say in the Gospel lesson? Oh, beautiful words for sin sick sinners who are disappointed with themselves again. "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” It is the glory of God that the victory in the war was won by Jesus. It is the glory of God for Jesus to give that victory to newborn babies brought to Him at Baptism and to the aged Christian with all the sin scars that come along with life. It is the glory of God to give that victory to those who despair of their own worthiness and to withhold it from those who arrogantly think they are “good enough” on their own.

          “But, Pastor,” you might say, “I’m tired of it all. I just want to be done and get it right for a change.” Hear God’s Good News. You have. You can. You will. You have. God already sees you as a perfectly obedient child, a perfect sin fighter in Jesus. You have His righteousness. You can. With the help of the Lord we overcome. Fight the battles. You can win some. The fact that you are fighting is the real joy. You will. While you can’t get rid of your sinful nature on earth, it won’t follow you into heaven. At death God separates it from you for good. How fun will that be! Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord indeed! Amen.

OUR NATION SUNDAY July 5-7, 2014 Pastor Timothy J. Spaude Text: Jeremiah 29:1-14 “A CHRISTIAN RESPONSE TO THE STATE OF THE NATION”

OUR NATION SUNDAY

July 5-7, 2014

Pastor Timothy J. Spaude

Text: Jeremiah 29:1-14

“A CHRISTIAN RESPONSE TO THE STATE OF THE NATION”

1.     Understand that God has a plan.

2.     Bloom where you are planted.

3.     Rejoice in the wisdom, love and power of God!

Jeremiah 29:1-14 (NIV 1984) “This is the text of the letter that the prophet Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to the surviving elders among the exiles and to the priests, the prophets and all the other people Nebuchadnezzar had carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon. 2 (This was after King Jehoiachin and the queen mother, the court officials and the leaders of Judah and Jerusalem, the craftsmen and the artisans had gone into exile from Jerusalem.) 3 He entrusted the letter to Elasah son of Shaphan and to Gemariah son of Hilkiah, whom Zedekiah king of Judah sent to King Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon. It said: 4 This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: 5 "Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. 6 Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. 7 Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper." 8 Yes, this is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: "Do not let the prophets and diviners among you deceive you. Do not listen to the dreams you encourage them to have. 9 They are prophesying lies to you in my name. I have not sent them," declares the LORD. 10 This is what the LORD says: "When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place. 11 For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile."

          God’s people have often felt themselves feeling like fish out of water, strangers in a strange land, people who don’t fit in. Abram experienced it when God called him to leave his family and his people and go to a place God would show him, a placed filled with people that did not worship the only Savior God. Jacob and his family felt it when God used a famine to move them to Egypt. Jacob’s descendants, the Israelites, felt it when God led them out of  Egypt to the Promised Land. Yes, it was a land flowing with milk and honey but it was also filled with peoples that worshiped idols in weird and perverted ways. At the time God had Jeremiah serve as prophet God’s people felt it again. They were strangers in a strange land, exiles from Judah carried off to Babylon. What should they do? What should we do? Are you feeling it? Are you starting to feel like a stranger living in a strange land? As followers of Christ who are committed to Him and His word above all we can’t help but feel it. What’s going on here? Things are changing so rapidly. Members of the greatest generation, that’s you WWII era saints, you know there was sin, shameful sin around at your time. But at least it was called sin and spoken of with shame. Did you shed a tear a 4^th of July parade because you love your country and it’s not what it used to be? Did you think of other parades in our country where people march for the right to murder their own babies or to sin sexually in ways that God calls unnatural and a perversion? What should we do? Run to the word of God of course! The words God has given to provide comfort and peace for His dearly loved people who find themselves living as strangers in a strange land.

          The first truth we find is that God has a plan. Now you heard the history in the opening verses. This was part of a letter God had Jeremiah send to Jewish believers who had be exiled to Babylon. They were taken from their homes, the land they knew and were now stuck in a city not of their choosing. Can you imagine how they felt, their hurt, their sadness, their lack of understanding, their ache to be somewhere else, their longing for home? What should they do? Understand that God has a plan.  “This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.” Did you hear that? Did you pick it out? “I carried.” “I carried!” said the LORD almighty, the God of Israel. It looked like the Babylonians had force marched these people of God but it wasn’t true. God carried them into exile. And it wasn’t done on a whim. Later God would say, “For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” God had a plan for His people. An “I love you this is for your good plan.” And He does for us too. You more senior saints have a much better perspective of this than I do but I have seen candidates elected and re-elected who should never have made it by every standard of human reason. I have seen judges legislate from the bench and get away with it despite the checks and balances our forefathers tried to put in. I have seen Supreme Court decisions uphold what people on both sides of issues have agreed were unconstitutional laws. Is it not possible that we are seeing the hand of God at work? God has said He will work all things for our good. The highest honor that we can give Him is simply to believe what He says, take Him at His word. On the flip side there is no greater disservice to God, no greater insult or slap in His face than to disbelieve Him and label Him a liar. God has a plan.

          So bloom where you are planted. That’s a phrase wise people have told others who were always looking over the fence and wishing themselves elsewhere. Bloom where you are planted means to do your best and be your best where you are at for the glory of God. Let’s see how Jeremiah put it.  "Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. 6 Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. 7 Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper." No wallowing in self pity. No angry resentment leading to a resistance movement and acts of sabotage. Bloom where you are planted. Live there. Have children so there are more of you. Seek the good and prosperity. Pray for the city so that you prosper.

          Godly wisdom for us too.  We might feel like giving up. We can have righteous anger against advancing wickedness. But remember who we are: the people of God, chosen by Him and dearly loved. Our nation needs us. We are God’s representatives here, His face of what real love looks like, His hands to help others, His mouth to speak His truth. So bloom where He has planted you. When we Christians work hard at our jobs, are the most helpful of neighbors we mute the slander of the Christ and Christian haters. “Well I know a Christian and she’s really nice.” Have you heard this? “I’d be afraid to bring a child into this world!” Nonsense! Is God dead? If we Christians stop having kids then what? God’s still in control and there is this thing called “Obstetrical Evangelism,” growing the Church by having babies! Seeking the peace and prosperity brings blessings for us too. How good it is to have Christians working in government, police, military, fire, healthcare and public education. The peace and prosperity of our nation depend on it. Pray. Pray for the nation and its leaders. Even the ones we don’t like and did not vote for. Bloom where you are planted.

          And rejoice in the wisdom, love and power of God. God told His people not to listen to the false prophets who were telling the people they were going home the next day.  They would have to wait seventy years. During these 70 years God would preserve His people and refine them, helping them live God dependent lives. Then He would bring them back. He would do that because this was all part of God’s bigger plan to give the world a Savior, Jesus Christ. How often do you think they asked for this verse to be read? “For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” What a memory treasure! For us too! It reminds us of God’s tender love that is combined with His ultimate wisdom and His power to do anything that is at work in our lives too.

          Strangers in a strange land? Absolutely! It’s what we are because Christ called us. Maybe it’s good for us to see that a little more. I don’t know the details of God’s plan is for our nation, for us as Christians, for myself or my family. He has not chosen to reveal that exactly like He did with the people of  Jeremiah’s time. I do know that God is loving wise and powerful. I know that He has a plan to prosper not harm us. You know that too. So let’s put away the gloom and doom, plant those smiles on our faces and as the dearly loved children of God that we are, leave here to be the best of American citizens who mean it and are heard when we pray, “God bless the USA!” Amen.

Sermon - June 28/29/30, 2014

Sermon June 28/29/30,2014, Pentecost 3
Retirement sermon by Pastor Paul G. Eckert

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        There is a reason I chose June 30 as the date for fully retiring.  It is
because it was on June 30 in 1957 that I was first installed as a pastor
and given the wonderful privilege of serving in the public ministry of
Jesus, my and your Savior and Lord.  Thinking of that beginning date, I
thought it would be meaningful, at least to me, to choose June 30, the
beginning date, as also the ending date to leave the called public
ministry - but certainly not to leave my daily Christian life.  By choosing
and announcing June 30 as the retirement date, I now knew and you
were informed as to exactly when, God willing, that would happen. 
        But there is another day that is coming, an unknown date, about
which Jesus said, “Heaven and earth will pass away ---”, but then also
said “No one knows about that day or hour ---.”
        What about that final day, or our own individual final day?  What is
important with regard to that and applies to all of us?  What is important
is that  IT’S ALL ABOUT JESUS!   It’s all about God’s Son who in
our text assures all of His followers that they have a wonderful
retirement home waiting for them. 
IT’S ALL ABOUT JESUS!
I   HE IS THE WAY.  (1-2,6)
    1. There is something that is coming.  (1a)
“Do  not let your hearts be troubled.” 
        a) There is something that is troubling, namely death.  Jesus had
             been talking about that with His disciples when He had instituted
            the Lord’s Supper and had referred to His coming death when
            His body would be given and His blood would be shed.  But not
            only His death was coming.  He said that His disciples also
            would be at risk.  Violent deaths were coming for just about all
            of them too.
        b) But it doesn’t take a violent death, does it, to make death
            troubling.  Death and trouble came because of Adam and Eve’s
            sin.  It’s not what God intended with His creation.  Death is
            troubling.  Yet Jesus told them here not to be troubled.
    2. Trust what Jesus says.  (1-2a)
“Do  not let your hearts be troubled.  Trust in God; trust also in me.
In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would
have told you.” 
        a) Jesus knew who He was and why He had come, as Scripture says
            elsewhere about Him: “[He] made himself nothing, taking the
very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being
found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became
obedient to death - even death on a cross!”
        b) But in our text Jesus also spoke about after His death, about
            being in heaven again, in His Father’s house, and said that we
            would be there too in our own dwelling places.  For that our text
            uses the word “rooms”, but that might make us think of small
            one room apartments.  More accurately translated it should be
            not rooms but dwelling places, where we will dwell in heaven.
    3.  Thank God for Jesus’ preparations!  (2)
“In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would
have told you.  I am  going [there] to  prepare a place for you.”
        a) The word “there” is not in the original Greek here.  That makes it
            sound as though Jesus was going to prepare our dwelling places
            there in heaven, like maybe cleaning up before we get there.  I’m
            sure that won’t be necessary.
        b) Jesus wasn’t going there to heaven to prepare.  His preparing was
            the work He was doing right here on earth.  That preparing took
            Him from the table where He had instituted the Lord’s Supper to
            the Garden of Gethsemane where He prayed in agony, asking if
            there was another way to save us, but ending His prayer with
            “Your will be done.”  That preparing brought Him before the
            church leaders who rejected Him as the promised Christ, to
            Pontius Pilate who recognized His innocence but sentenced Him
            to death, to the cross where He cried out in agony, “My God,
            My God, why have You forsaken Me?”, and then - His
            preparing work for our salvation being completed - victoriously
            shouted out “It is finished!”, and three days later proved His
            preparations completed with His resurrection from the dead.
    4. Thank God that Jesus is the way.    (2,6)
        a) Remember that we have been promised a heavenly home.  (2)
“In my Father’s house are many rooms (dwelling places); if it were
not so, I would have told you.  I am  going [there] to  prepare a
place for you.”
        b) We don’t and can’t get there  by any of our efforts or money  or
             anything else.  Jesus did all the preparing necessary. 
        c) Thank God  Jesus is the Way - IT’S ALL ABOUT JESUS!  (6)
 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life.  No one
comes to the Father except through me.”
II   HE IS THE TRUTH  (2-6)
    1. We can be like Thomas.  (4-5)
“You know the way to the place where I am going.”  Thomas said to
him, “Lord, we don’t know where  you are going, so how can we
know the way?”
        a) Jesus had instructed His disciples for three years, spoken clearly
            even as to the exact day, the third day after His death, that He
            would arise from the dead.  Yet Thomas doubted also that
            fulfilled truth for a whole week after Jesus’ resurrection.    
        b) What about us?  The best medical science can’t stop death, let
            alone promise us something after death.  Can we too doubt?
    2. How can we be sure?  (5)
Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where  you are going, so
how can we know the way?”
        a) Jesus fulfilled everything Scripture had foretold about Him.  The
             disciples had those Old Testament prophecies.  They personally
            saw Jesus fulfill every promise that had been made about Him.
        b) We have the same Scripture, the Old Testament promises and the
            New Testament fulfillment.  Hear that Word.  Continue in that
            Word.  God does keep His promises.
    3. Yes, Jesus always spoke the truth.
        a) Before Pontius Pilate Jesus had said, “Everyone on the side of
truth listens to me.” and Pilate responded, “What is truth?”
        b) Don’t be like Pontius Pilate or like doubting Thomas.  There is
            such a thing as God’s truth about which we can be sure.
    4. Thank God that Jesus is the truth.  (6)
Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life.  No one
comes to the Father except through me.”
        a) Jesus said (Mt. 24:35b), “My words will never pass away.”
        b) Yes, IT’S ALL ABOUT JESUS!  Jesus has proved His truth.
        c) And we’ll be a part of that proof in our own resurrections to life.  
III   HE IS THE LIFE.  (1,3,6)
    1. Let trust fill our lives.  (1)
“Do  not let your hearts be troubled.  Trust in God; trust also in
me.”
        a) After a funeral we see only death and not life and perfection.
        b) But we know Jesus is alive, a fact witnessed by hundreds of
            people, and we have Jesus’ promise: “I am the resurrection
and the life.  He who believes in me will live, even though he dies.”
    2. Firmly trust Jesus’ promises.  (3)
“If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you
to be with me that you also may be where I am.”
        a) Our death or the last day will usher those who believe in Jesus
            into His presence to be where He is.  What will that be like?
        b) Listen to the picture description the book of Revelation gives us
            about that: “I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming
down out of heaven from God ---.  And I heard a loud voice from
the throne saying, ‘Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he
will live with them.  They will be his people, and God himself will be
with them and be their God.  He will wipe every tear from their
eyes.  There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain,
for the old order of things has passed away.’”
    3. So let us clearly confess “IT’S ALL ABOUT JESUS!”  (6b)
“No one comes to the Father except through me.”
        a) Only Jesus, God’s Son, paid for the wages of our sins.
        b) Clearly confess that.  And be sure to share that with others as
            God gives us openings to speak, and as we use our offerings
            to enable others to proclaim Jesus where we cannot.
    4. And always rejoice in what He has promised.  (6)
Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life.  No one
comes to the Father except through me.”
        a) Jesus is the way, the only way - He has saved us from our sins.
        b) Jesus is the truth - don’t doubt, but believe and rejoice.
        c) Jesus is the life - because of Him whoever believes and is
            baptized will not perish but have everlasting life in glory.

        Heaven in all of its perfection!  What a wonderful retirement for all
of us to look forward to.  And IT’S ALL ABOUT JESUS!